A Chronic Hysteria
by handschuhmaus
Summary: Scalloped potatoes, bees on the Knight Bus, dogs riding carpet sweepers, and The Scarf. After her potion explodes, Tonks and her professor go on an out of this world adventure. Doctor Who themed. One shot.


_Disclaimer: I don't own the characters or anything else you recognize, but I think I own the idea of dogs riding carpet sweepers. The__ characters are Rowling's, the dream is a mash-up of Doctor Who, and a couple of elements I snitched from PTerry._

_A/N: Do note that the very end of the story is apparently set in an alternate universe where Voldemort is merely a more minor threat at the time that Remus and Tonks are courting, the summer before the trio's seventh year. This fic is certified to contain minimal violence, and will not require you to hide behind the couch to read it (unless you have a phobia of dogs on carpet sweepers, and then I cannot help you). It contains neither sexual content, nor innuendos, and exactly as much offensive language as one Rhett Butler, although if you dislike the prospect of fics containing both reference to bees and potatoes, please don't read. There is a minimal student/teacher crush between Dora and her professor. The plot bunny adopted me after I saw a couple of very small, very fluffy dogs (__**might**__ have been Pomeranians) on an elevated deck where it appeared they could not use the stairs. Yes, I tend to see Daleks everywhere, even though they are _not _tattooed on my eyeballs.__  
_

They were making a magic probing potion to help Nymphadora Tonks, who was now in her seventh year and had aspirations of becoming an Auror, discover if she had any other magical talents. Other than being a metamorphagus, that was. This particular potion worked better if the person who was to use it made it, and it was required that a strand of her hair be added. She had added the strand of hair, and then Professor Snape had come over and instructed her to fetch him the vial of acid for the nerve tonic he was making as he macerated a funny-smelling mandrake, while he watched the potion at this crucial point.

'Dora had absolutely no idea what she tripped over as she returned carrying the vial of acid. Was it her own big feet, or was it the professor's cloak? In any case, she fell into him, he dropped the cauldron he was either cleaning or coating with something onto the counter, and the vial of acid when flying. Time seemed to slow as it lazily cartwheeled in an arc directly into her potion. Professor Snape grabbed the girl and tried to cover her face with his cloak, but the probing potion exploded with such great force that he lost his footing and the two of them fell to the floor only to be spattered by sticky pale green goop. His student opened her mouth to say something and a blob of potion fell right into her face. "It tastes like lime flavoured cola," she informed her professor sleepily, as he too fell asleep, his face a mask of horror.

_Nymphadora had been visiting her cousin Sirius in Azkaban—they didn't talk much, and she still didn't understand at all why he had betrayed the Potters—he still seemed almost sympathetic to the Gryffindor cause. But as she walked out of the checkpoint, a cloud of dementors—the air thick with their presence, almost as if blocks could be cut from the air, and a dementor- fort be built. Or else she could snatch a handful of the stuff and throw it, like a snowball. She giggled dementedly at the thought and backed towards the door._

_Severus Snape could see the girl being pursued by the army of dementors. He tried to cast a Patronus, but the spell seemed to fizzle out and then he could not seem to remember how to do it… just—"Run!" He grabbed the girl's hand, and they ran full tilt out of the doors of Azkaban. _

"_But, Sir, they'll follow us! They're dementors!" she exclaimed. _

"_Don't worry." He said, somehow reverting back to the roughly accented speech of his childhood. "Just stand back." He whipped out the wand and by waving it over the doorknob, locked the prison. "Do come on! I'm the… Doctor, " the words seem to pop into his head unbidden "nice to meet you."_

_She noticed the Knight Bus in front of her, or at least it seemed to be the Knight Bus… rather an old bus, too… and sitting in front of Azkaban? "Nymphadora Tonks" she introduced herself to the Doctor._

_Severus waved his wand in front of the bus doors and they opened to reveal a comfortably furnished but rather bare warehouse building. His companion did not appear to be particularly startled, and the logical part of him that was muttering _This is only a hallucination. Only a hallucination or a dream. Presently my… _No, __**that**__ is a poem!... did not find the idea of bus doors opening into a warehouse sort of place the worst possible thing that could occur . They entered the bus._

"_Calling __**that**__ long name is a waste of time. I'll call you Adora," he said lightly, looking around the bus, which was currently rather dark._

_Nymphadora flipped a light switch her inquiring hand found on the wall. "I don't like 'Adora'." _

"_Well, it's either Adora or Frank," he said, moving over to a panel containing a number of controls._

"_Call me 'Frank', then," she suggested, hoping he would understand the joke._

_Severus replied "Good. Come on then, Adora." He looked down at his outfit. He was presently wearing a trench-coat, which did at least billow pleasingly sort of like a cape, but there was a cactus pad stuck to it by the right lapel by some sort of sticking charm, and there was an outlandishly long striped scarf around his neck. Furthermore, his hair was combed back, and there seemed to be a bee stuck to the end of his wand. He was having an urge to say the word "Fantastic" as he somehow remembered what the switch his finger was on did and his inner self commented caustically on the color choice for the scarf—mustard, navy, and forest—now what sort of idiot would pair up those colors?_

_Nymphadora was examining a beehive, of all things, that was on the counter. "I believe I know how to work this, sir," she said._

"_Oh…yes…" and then, as if under the Imperius curse, he adeptly tripped over the feet of a coat-rack and caught himself before re-hanging a coat that he had knocked off the rack._

_The scene seemed to blur, and then he found himself back on the other side of the coat-rack even though he could have sworn he hadn't moved._

"_Oh, blast, here we go again!" the young girl exclaimed as she moved some pegs around in the shelf she had removed from the hive. He fell over the coat rack again._

_The words "What's the matter?" escaped from his mouth before he could stop them._

"_Out of Pollen error, sir." _

"_Hah! That's __**easy**__. Kick the hive, then."_

"_I've tried just about everything else… it might work." _

_There was a scraping sound, as a fountain pen attached by an intricate lever system to the beehive wrote on a scroll sitting beneath it on the table. It said "THANK YOU MISS"._

_They looked at each other in befuddlement._

"_Oh, blast, here we go again!" Nymphadora exclaimed in frustration, but partially as if she couldn't help it._

_He once more got his feet caught in the bottom of the coat rack. "What's the matter?" he asked, and internally added "This time…?"_

"_Out of Pollen error, sir."_

"_Hah! That's easy. Kick the hive…th-en." The bus seemed to hiccup._

"_I've… just… just… just…might work."_

_The beehive reported its congratulations._

"_Talk about déjà-vu!" Severus exclaimed. _

"_What's going on, sir?" _

"_It must…" he was suddenly gripped by a terrific headache, and found himself tripping over the coat rack again, though this time it felt as if he were moving through a bog, as once more his young companion exclaimed "Oh, blast, here we go __**again!**__"_

"_Whatsa matter?" he slurred._

"_Out of Pollen—sir!"_

"_Hah!" he exclaimed shortly, but found himself unable to utter the rest of the line, seemingly choked. "…That's easy! Kick the hive!" he said with renewed determination._

"_I've tried just about everything else, it just might work."_

_Once more, the beehive scrawled its congratulations via its lever arm, but due to whatever had caused the bizarre effects on the bus, it had failed to scroll its paper source down and so wrote partially over the previous message._

"_Don't do exactly what you are supposed to. It's the Spiralbriar in the nerve tonic—it must have reacted. Just… mess it up somehow!"_

"_Oh… here it comes again." She said, less than enthusiastically._

"_Nothing's wrong." He said, leaning heavily against the coat rack_

"_It says I shouldn't, um, push the BRB."_

"_The what? That's easy. Just refrain."_

"_I've tried…" he gave her a ferocious glare and raised his eyebrows. "to fix the…" she gulped, "out of pollen error." _

_And this time, the beehive did indeed inform them it was OUT OF MEMORY. PLEASE CLEAN AND REPLACE HIVE SECTOR 0xA7F._

"_Fantastic!" he exclaimed, rather uncharacteristically. _

"_Why did that happen, Professor?" asked Nymphadora Tonks as momentarily their surroundings blurred and she almost stirred from the sleep of the unconscious._

"_Oh, because outside of your metabolism, nerve tonics don't like encountering certain fatty acids."_

"_Hmmm?" asked Adora, removing a comb from the hive and tapping the honey into a clean jar that she thought was probably used for the purpose._

"_I probably dropped the damn casserole in the nerve tonic."_

"_Casserole?" she asked, holding out the jar of honey._

_He looked rather nonplussed at her offer but apparently rather enthusiastic about some other notion. Then he proceeded to look sort of embarrassed. "If you must know, Tonks, I was trying to make scalloped potatoes."_

"_Why? Were you using a mandolin?"_

_He looked further startled and absentmindedly took the jar of honey from her. "Yes, I was using one of those, but how would you know about those?"_

_She shrugged. "My uncle's a chef."_

"_I see," he replied in a more typical manner, and went over to the controls, where he pushed several buttons and moved several levers before beginning to twist a wheel, rather like one that would be used to pilot a ship. "When to, Adora?"_

"_Let's go some__**place**__ else. After all, it is the __**T**__ARDIS!" she said gleefully, somehow managing to emphasize the T._

"_Fine then!" He spun the wheel wildly, and there was a creaking noise and them some rather space-alien-sound-effect-type music as the bus swung into motion._

"_You still haven't told me why you were making scalloped potatoes," she reminded him."And what did that have to do with the reaction to the nerve tonic?"_

"_Sometimes you remind me of Luna Lovegood." He said, absentmindedly, as their vehicle of transport shuddered. _

"_Who's that? I mean, I know Dad doesn't like Xenophilus Lovegood very well, says the man's insane, but who is that?" she asked._

"_Oh!" he exclaimed, as he suddenly stopped the wheel with his hand. "Someone you wouldn't know… yet, Miss Tonks."_

"_And the potatoes?"_

"_I __**thought**__ I would try to bring them to a family gathering. It's my late great-aunt's renowned recipe."_

"_Oh. When are we?"_

"_1985 or so."_

"_So we've gone back in time a little. Why?"_

"_I would suppose that for some reason your TARDIS felt that it would be a more useful time to visit this place."_

"_It's __**your**__ TARDIS, Doctor!" she exclaimed, as a sudden bump was administered to their vessel._

"_SURRENDER!" came a mechanical voice from outside the bus._

"_Surrender? I don't recall any of the Daleks ever saying that. And that's what it sounds like," she objected._

"_MY HEAR-ING IS IMPAIRED—MY HEAR-ING IS IMPAIRED" said another mechanical voice that seemed to be malfunctioning, for it was whiny, and more dissonant than was typical._

"_What are those things?" asked the Doctor, as he peered intently at the viewing screen._

"_They're not like any kind of Dalek I've ever seen." Adora ventured to comment._

"_Readings?"_

"_Radiation—Normal , Oxygen—Normal, Static Charge—High?"_

"_Hmmm… That's intriguing. Well, shall we go out and see?" he inquired, putting on his coat again._

_Nervously exiting the bus and locking the bus door with a mumbled charm—which oughtn't to have worked unless Severus had his wand, they made their way into a clearing, only to meet a congregation of what appeared to be various small dogs riding around on carpet sweepers. There was also a rather dingy looking creature of indeterminate gender, though its appearance tended towards the feminine, standing at the edge of the dark forest. _

"_What's going on here?" Adora asked._

"_YOU ARE SUR-ROUND-ED." One of the dogs informed her in a mechanical voice, without opening its mouth. "IT WILL DO YOU NO GOOD TO ES-CAPE. WE SHALL EX-TER-MIN-ATE YOU!"_

_The other dogs, which were of various breeds but were all riding on identical carpet sweepers, chorused "EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!"_

"_They're almost as bad as…" Severus almost commented and then bit his tongue, hoping not to ever reveal that shameful half of his life to his student, especially in this, his second year of teaching!_

"_Creatures…" said the other thing, in a dissonant but somewhat seductive voice. "What brings you here?"_

"_What are you?" Adora whispered, peering over the Doctor's shoulder on tiptoe._

"_I am an… elf" the thing replied reluctantly._

"_I am the Doctor," He said reassuringly. "What is going on here?"_

"_Oh!" said the creature gleefully "Then you know what happened to the Philosopher's Stone!"_

"_The… Philosopher's Stone!" Severus gasped._

After her student had not returned to her for some time, Minerva McGonagall decided to peek in on the dungeons. She saw Miss Tonks and the Potions professor both prostrate on the ground, apparently in the aftermath of a potions accident, covered with some sort of sweet smelling greenish goop. However, they didn't seem to be injured, and seemed to be resting pleasantly… As she turned to leave, she saw Severus jerk in his slumber, as if surprised, and he muttered something about a stone.

"_Yes, it was stolen!"_

"_By whom?" asked Adora._

"_By the one who calls himself Voldemort." The creature replied._

_Puzzled, but cognizant of the fact that the shared dream was beginning to reference his own memories as well as those of Miss Tonks, Severus began to occlude his mind, even as the potion's effects were beginning to wear off._

_The creature seemed to sulk and refuse to talk to them._

_There was then a group of whales that walked up to them, seemingly ignorant of the fact that they should not be moving about on land, and informed them that they needed their help to get rid of the Daleks. _

_They were clearly drifting off towards sleep._

_At that point, they walked through the congregation of dogs atop carpet sweepers—one of them raised a single paw towards the intruders, and Miss Tonks informed him that they needed to obtain pollen for their Hive before they could leave. When she had finished gathering a rather wilted bouquet of daisies, they tried to leave, but the field had become a large circular room with white walls that was spinning, constantly spinning…_

It was another half hour before Potions Master and student woke from their slumber, to a potion splattered classroom, a rapidly congealing green magic probing potion, a scorched nerve tonic, potatoes that had turned an unappealing brown, very soft butter, and groggy memories of their shared dream. Severus smiled oddly and sent the sleepy seventh year to her dormitory room as he began to repair the damage in a contemplative mood.

* * *

And that is why, when, years later, on a fall afternoon, the full-grown Auror and her fiancé, one werewolf named Remus Lupin, walked across the Hogwarts Quidditch pitch, headed for their seats next to the Weasley family, Tonks smiled quite happily at the sight of the caustic potions master, in a seat far above the field, wearing his typical black robes, and a very long striped, fringed scarf. He looked, for a moment, almost exactly like some shadowy silhouette of Tom Baker.

_A/N: I hope I have done some justice to the Doctor for all devoted Whovians out there. While this is meant to be a parody (and a dream parody at that!), I hope it doesn't totally dishonor the Doctor. I, being somewhat of a newbie, have only seen Hartnell, Eccleston, and a few clips of Baker (That's First, Ninth, and Fourth, if you didn't know the actors' names). Most of the dream is a mash up of the Chronic Hysteresis clip with what little I know of the plot of Meglos and a little of the First Doctor Daleks story ark, but there are a few little scenes thrown in from the first few episodes of Nine, and Tonks's introduction to the Doctor is borrowed from a quote between Romana and Four. The beehive computer bears a good deal of resemblance to that of a wizarding university… no, not something from the Potterverse, but Hex, the computer of Unseen University, in the Discworld books. The dingy elf is also vaguely borrowed from Discworld, in _Lords and Ladies_. The characters are meant to be fairly well OOC in the dream, and might be slightly so in the normal portions. The dream narration is inconsistent precisely because it is partly a dream. (and, admittedly, because I wrote this at different points when I was tired)_

_Do read and review.  
_


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